The European Union’s Responsibility to Protect

10.1163/9789004230002_011

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Chapter Summary

The member states of the European Union (EU) were among the strongest supporters of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P), and the EU as an organization has repeatedly reiterated its commitment to it both in discourse between its institutions and vis-à-vis the outside world. This chapter briefly recapitulates on the question whether and how far R2P is in itself a legal concept. Next, the focus is directed onto the implications of the R2P concept for the EU as a (sub)regional organization. The chapter then switches perspectives and looks at R2P from the EU's point of view, which implies a short reminder of the EU's stance vis-à-vis the United Nations as a regional organization in the sense of Chapter VIII of the UN Charter in general and the powers it has as well as the measures it has taken so far in order to implement R2P in a global framework.